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The Alumni Magazine of the Virginia Tech Department Of FALL 2019 ELETHE MALUMNI MAGAZINEENTS OF THE VIRGINIA TECH DEPARTMENT OF CHEMISTRY LETTER FROM THE CHAIR Dear Alumni and Friends of the Department, Welcome to the Fall 2019 issue of Elements. Fall 2019 was both extremely busy and incredibly successful for the department. In May 2019, Virginia Tech announced that a record number of freshman had indicated acceptance of admission for the Fall 2019 semester. Working with the College of Science, College of Engineering, the Office of the Provost and the Office of the University Registrar, our department immediately went to work to address the enormous challenge. We started planning for 7,700 freshman (final enrollment 7,604) with the realization that about 70 percent of the over-enrollment would need introductory-level general chemistry. Much of the burden for providing this instruction would fall upon our seven dedicated general chemistry instructors as well as Victoria Long and Michelle Dalton in our general chemistry laboratory. This fall, we ran 120 sections of general chemistry laboratory (2,880 seats) by utilizing six labs, four sections/day, five days/week, and offered 11 sections of non-majors general chemistry lectures to accommodate 3,347 students. This spring, we will be running nearly 1,000 students through four different classes: first and second semester general chemistry lecture and lab. In Fall 2020, the focus will switch to organic chemistry and planning is already underway. While these challenges were immense, they were not insurmountable with additional resources afforded to the department by the Provost and educational initiatives already underway within the department. In this issue of Elements, we highlight new curricula and other educational initiatives designed to allow the department to remain relevant in the future and to continue to provide an efficient, high-quality education to thousands of students per year. As in past issues, we also share with you a subset of our faculty, student and alumni successes. We hope you enjoy the issue and, as always, thank you for your unwavering support of our department. Sincerely, Alan Esker Chair, Department of Chemistry 2 ELEMENTS FALL 2019 CONTENTS EDITORIAL Editor-in-Chief: Alan Esker Writer: Corrin Lundquist FEATURE: RESHAPING EDUCATION Design: Corrin Lundquist 4 DEPARTMENT OF OF NOTE: CHEMISTRY Department Chair: Alan Esker 8 Joseph Merola Named ACS Fellow Associate Chair: Amanda Morris New Faces Director of Undergraduate Programs: Louis Madsen Promoted to Full Professor Patricia Amateis Director of the Graduate Program: Valerie Welborn Joins Faculty John Morris Amanda Morris Named Patricia Caldwell Faculty Fellow Greg Liu Named Blackwood Junior Faculty Fellow New in Research TELL US WHAT YOU THINK Notable Awards We welcome your comments Abby Bratton Shares Impact of the Ward Fellowship and story ideas for future issues: [email protected] Chengzhe Gao Receives Eastman Fellowship KEEP UP WITH US Follow us on Facebook (VTCHEM) IN MEMORIAM: JOHN SCHUG and Twitter (@VTChemDept) 14 Virginia Tech is an equal opportunity/ affirmative action institution. ON THE COVER Two freshmen chemistry majors work together in the new Hahn Hall North 301 laboratory classroom. Read more on page 6. 3 FEATURE RESHAPING EDUCATION Facing new challenges with an increase in enrollment numbers, the department is reshaping what it looks like to teach chemistry to more students than ever. BY CORRIN LUNDQUIST With every incoming class of freshmen comes new challenges, 36 percent of the freshman class coming from underrespresented as ever-changing technology, students from increasingly diverse or underserved groups including first-generation students, backgrounds and large class sizes become the norm. Instructors transfer students, veterans and low-income students. The within the department are often the leaders of change, taking department is working to meet their needs by introducing a on classes that educate hundreds of students each semester new course for students who may desire more community (see and maintaining the high caliber of instruction for which the “Reshaping Experiences”). department is known. Lastly, large class sizes remain an important part of teaching Over th past few years, technology has improved rapidly and introductory lectures and instructors Maggie Bump and online learning has become more ubiquitous across college Michael Berg are working to help students be more successful campuses. The format is still being perfected, but advanced and meeting them where they are (see: “Reshaping Confidence instructor Vicki Long has developed a useful application for it through Second Chances”). in the lab (see “Reshaping Scientificy Writing Pedagogy”). Read on to see more about how our instructors are paving the Students now come from increasingly diverse backgrounds, with way to maintaining a high quality chemistry education. 4 ELEMENTS / FEATURE RESHAPING CONFIDENCE THROUGH SECOND CHANCES Drs. Michael Berg and Maggie Bump are two stalwart instructors of the department’s large organic chemistry lectures. Between the pair, their first-semester organic chemistry lectures had almost 850 students enrolled this fall. Organic chemistry can be a difficult subject for students who are more accustomed to the math-based curriculum of general RESHAPING SCIENTIFIC WRITING PEDAGOGY chemistry. A few years ago, the two instructors started noticing the grade data indicated that performance on the first exam How do you teach scientific writing to 2,880 incoming new could serve as a predictor of success in the class. students in 120 sections of general chemistry laboratories with 42 graduate teaching assistants? “Part of what’s happening is their confidence is undermined: if they fail the first test, they give up,” explained Maggie. Mike This is the challenge that Vicki Long has tackled. She and her added, “Our thought process was to do a Test 1 ‘do over’.” team collected data from this fall’s 2,880 students to evaluate their perception of the importance of learning to write a well- That year, the fall break fell shortly after the first exam, so they developed report as well as their experience writing scientific developed an “Organic Chemistry Boot Camp”: a full-day session reports. 75 percent of the incoming students felt that writing that would review the topics covered on the test. The boot camp a well-developed scientific report would be very important for took place on the Friday of fall break and the students could re- their academic and future careers, yet 45 percent had little to no take the exam on Saturday. experience writing a scientific report. At the end of the semester, they analyzed the data and realized To address this, Vicki co-developed and now utilizes online the number of students who had withdrawn from the course active and adaptive lessons for scientific writing with a “Step- had decreased. They took this data to the Center for Excellence wise Writing Approach” for writing assignments. in Teaching and Learning (CETL) to work on developing a grant to see if this data could be replicated. The active learning modules promote learning by doing, thus engaging students through scientifically accurate and graphically The pair was awarded a grant from CETL’s Teaching Large rich simulations to help them explore and understand complex Classes Instructional Grant Program to create an “Intensive concepts. Additionally, these online modules are adaptive, short course for the remediation of a self-selected, initially meaning they change and respond to each student’s knowledge, underperforming cohort in a large organic chemistry class.” skills and learning needs. The modules were designed specifically While the past two years’ academic calendars haven’t lined up for the writing components and divided the information into with the curriculum schedule, the pair haven’t given up looking six lessons: citations, concision and clarity, tense and voice, lab for solutions for student success. reports, presenting data and reading data critically. Maggie indicated that the work isn’t over yet. “What we’re A step-wise and scaffold approach was used for the post- continuing to investigate is how their confidence in their ability laboratory assignments which allowed students to gain versus their understanding of the material can contribute to competency one section at a time. The scaffold approach their success in the course.” provided a series of questions after the lab, the answers to which students combined to write that section. The goal is that by the end of the course, students will complete formal laboratory written reports of the last three experiments. So far, Vicki and her team have been exceptionally pleased with the students’ progress in learning to write reports, and students have been receptive to the material. For Vicki’s full report, visit the department’s website at www.chem.vt.edu/about-us/elements FALL 2019 5 FEATURE / RESHAPING LAB SPACE (LITERALLY) Over the summer, Hahn Hall North 301 was renovated to become a new lab space for General Chemistry Laboratory for Majors. The space previously held the Chemistry Learning Center (CLC) which was moved to the second floor of Davidson Hall. Along with the new lab space comes new instrumentation from Shimadzu, including a gas chromatograph and a mass spectrometer. Check out these photos of the lab in action. A student in General Chemistry for Majors Lab performs a titration. A row of balances waiting for use. Most of the equipment in the new lab migrated over from the old General Chemistry
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